so i get off the plane late this afternoon and finally make it to my truck and start the ride home - - on the news i hear that some kook who claims to have a bomb strapped to his chest has taken over the clinton campaign office in a small town in new hampshire! and they say that this kook wants to speak to hillary! that certainly qualifies him in the "kook" category....

in the hour it took me to get home, it appears that all the hostages were let go. i haven't heard how it all ended, but i imagine they've taken him to kook central where he can chat with ron and maybe a few aliens....

can you imagine IF this would turn out to be some sort of "planned event".......holy mackarel.....

now i ain't saying it is - - it's purely a "what if" conspiracy theory thing.....((nudge nudge, wink wink - ya know what i mean))

takes the heat off the clinton news network after that fiasco in st petersburg the other night.....hmmmmmmm could it be?!

managed to catch some (most maybe) of the debate last night. trash - embarassing; it was really horrible. considering the format, the stupidity of the questions, the obvious plants, and the insulting opening "song"(?) i thought the gop guys held their own. no particular winner, no particular standout - some good one liners but when you're asked such rediculous questions there's not much you can do - and they did about the best they could.

it was nothing but a cnn bash conservatives evening - anything they could do to make us look like morons. i was so mad i had to turn it off.....go back and take a look at any of the dems debates - - find one, just one time that they were asked their opinion of the "rebel flag"; or find me just one question where they were asked if they "believe the words in this book...yes, this book"; or a "what would Jesus do" question; or even the gays in the military nonsense - has anyone heard the dems asked about that? or find where the dem debates had a opening song about how there's only one gop candidate and eight dems fighting over the vote.....


anyway - on to other things.....i can't dwell on politics this election cycle...puts my bp up! :)

on the plane the other day i sat next to a fellow who is a "professional santa" and he was headed down here to take a winter job in a department store as their week-end santa. he was pretty excited about it - but he did mention that he wasn't allowed to "ho ho ho". we discussed the absurdity of it, but he was convinced he'd make it work "for the kids". best of luck to him - i hope he has a good time...

i still have my santa costume - - played santa for a good many years while i was in the Navy. parties, school events, the bx, bout anywhere. it's good to see the kids eyes light up when santa comes in - - and even better when they really can't figure out who it is!!! we always had a good time around the holidays....even took my own girls a bit of time to figure it out....

last thing ---- here's a ponder for you - - how come hotel remotes have a "sleep" button that doesn't work? out of all the buttons on a remote how do you get one buttob not to work? lol lol

been a busy week-end around our house! after a great Thanksgiving dinner with my brother and sister-in-law and our nephew, we did the football couch potato thing for the rest of that day......lol

we tried something different this year - - we bought a boneless prime rib and roasted it. no turkey, no ham - - prime rib - - and i gotta say, it came out extremely nice! was delicious. we'll probably do a turkey for Christmas - but we all just felt like something different for this Thanksgiving.

then we spent saturday doing a bit of decorating outside - - lighted candy canes, some red and white rope lights, front door decorations and the candles in the windows. not sure about the tree yet - we haven't decided if we're going to go for the tree or not. i'm voting for the not; but we all know how that works.... :)

this is the time of year when the Christmas craft shows are held around here. we went to one down by my mother-in-laws last weekend and this past sunday we went to another one. i think we have plans to visit two more that will be in this area and that will be about it for the craft shows. even the wife admits that most of the same vendors are at all of them - - but there were a few different things to see...it's fun just to get out and look and see the crowds....

i leave for tampa in the morning - back on friday. then denver all the following week. hot to cold - - figure i should have a great case of pneumonia by 7 Dec! lol

this is a terrific video clip! two of my all time favorites doing what they did so well! i ran across this clip over at Life of Red's blog. So here's the challenge - - what movie is this from?


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happy thanksgiving!!!!!! enjoy a smile!

wellll it's saterdy night! lol

one of the things we've really come to like is a tv channel known as rfd - - the rural farm network. love it! especially on saturday nights....we get to watch some great country music shows, including some of the branson music shows. plus a country music show with really local type talent from somewhere up in minnesota. then at 10pm eastern is the big joe polka hour - which is my own personal favorite hour of television....

where i grew up in eastern ohio - midway between pittsburgh and cleveland there is a lot of folks from the old country - - polish, hungarian, german - - great people. couple of my best friends growing up used to take me along to family gatherings, weddings, parties - - polkas were everywhere! i think that the first time i ever danced with a girl was at one of those gatherings and it was a polka! if you've never been to a real honest-to-goodness polka party - you should look one up and go - - guarantee you'll have fun!

dunno why i'm posting about polka music - - lol - -
click here and check out this website - plays polka music all the time. click your favorite audio program and give a listen - see if it don't make your foot tap!

wow - - my bloggin is slippin.....back to travelling again, so it's harder to spend the time sitting down to do this when most nights i'm working til who knows when.....

just a couple of things i've been pondering here lately....

wife and i are fans of 'dancing with the stars'. we enjoy watching and picking our favorites. i think it's probably one of the better shows on tv. probably one of the biggest reasons is the host - tom bergeron - - he's one of the best in the business. and i also like the fact that while they do use well known 'stars', they don't use like what i would consider A list stars.....the really big name people. for the most part they choose really likeable, down-to-earth people, who are willing to dedicate a LOT of time to learn the dance steps and compete against each other. plus the judges are a big part of the show - - some weeks they're crass and really rough on them, some weeks they're funny and build up their abilities.....but they're never insulting or badgering like that other show - where they do the singers - - we don't like it, so i can't even think of the name....

anyway, they've had a really good bunch on this run and its getting down to the semi-finals this next week. should be a good show. marie osmond has really surprised us by hanging in as long as she has - - she must have a huge fan base, cause her scores aren't really that good.....

we'll see how it ends up......

monday m orning update: it's monday morning. we heard on the late news last night that another accident had happened at this same intersection earlier yesterday evening. two people died in the collision of a motorcycle and a couple of cars. the motorcyclist was one of the deaths. the state transportation folks have rejected putting a traffic signal at this intersection for some years now. there is a flashing yellow light there.


we've had a couple of real tragedies around here this past week. last monday morning a car full of teens on their way to school pulled out in front of one of those little box trucks. the driver - 17 died at the scene; her brother - 14 - died friday afternoon; two other girls were hospitalized - one has since been released, the other is doing ok. the kids and their families live here in town - just up the road from us actually. seatbelts were worn.

it's a nasty intersection on an even nastier highway. it's four-lane with medium in the middle. she was making a left turn. either didn't see, or mis-judged the speed of the oncoming truck. the truck hit her car point on drivers door. you could tell the driver of the truck tried to swerve out of the way, his wheels were cranked hard, and the truck rolled over probably 3-4 times before coming to a stop upside down in the medium. the three guys in the truck had minor injuries.

then on tuesday afternoon - next county over. five young men - all best of friends - driving home after shooting some hoops after school - - sort of an unofficial basketball practice. ages anywhere from 14-17, sophmores and juniors. just driving home down a well-traveled two-lane road. appears the young driver may have drifted off the right edge of the paved road and then over-corrected when he pulled it back onto the road. driver and three of the four passengers died in the collision with the oncoming car. the surviving young man was squished in the middle in the back - might have saved his life being squished in. no seat belts were worn.

it's a shame. it's terrible. lousy wastes of life.

in both cases the young drivers had both only recently gotten their driver's licenses. and in maryland law says that new, young driver's are not allowed to drive around with their car full of kids - as was the case in both of these tragedies.

and it's a good law - - but unfortunately, it relies heavily on the parent's to police it and make it effective. and most parents simply are not going to restrict their teen's driving privileges. hopefully with all the press and media attention that these two accidents have received around here, some folks will see the possibility for tragedy and stop and think when their kids get behind the wheel of the car.

used to be - back when i got my license - there weren't nearly as many cars on the road - and driving was a skill to be mastered. we really wanted to know how to drive that car and seriously took driver's ed classes and practiced with our folks. i mean, i really wanted to be good at manipulating that car around. for one thing, it meant i could do more at my job. i could drive the truck and help haul the tree limbs we were cutting down. for another, it meant i didn't have to have my dad drive me and a girl to the movies or to the park or whatever.

and it was that way for all my friends too - - we all wanted to learn to drive and be good at it.

in today's world - none of that matters. there are cars and trucks everywhere. crowded is putting it mildly. and the "how to" part of driving isn't taught anymore. in fact, driver's ed isn't even a school subject anymore. driving skills are not taught. and the kids just aren't getting them. and their parent's don't even realize it. welll - - they got their license, they must be good driver's - ok, here's your car. have fun...........yeah, right......

I've pre=dated this one for 10Nov - so it will stay on top for a while..

UPDATE 10/27 - the lubbock marine parents folks now have a mailing address! they've posted it up on the site. makes it easier because you don't have to contact them to send them donations or help out. Please give the site a look and help out our troops that will be away from home and families during the upcoming holidays...

i know it may seem early to some - - but when you're making packages to send to our troops the mailing deadline is closer than we think!

if you find it in your heart and want to help out - there are lots of places to go to help make the season a little better for all our troops that won't be able to be home this season...

my favorite is at http://lubbockmarineparents.blogspot.com

check out the site and if you can help them - do it.....they have lots of ways it can be done - - paypal, checks, bank deposits....whatever you can do to help out is certainly appreciated!

Lubbock Marine Parents

go there now.....

i added a link over on the "blogs i visit" section to the south river knitting guild page. mostly for my wife --- she's a knitter and is a member of that particular guild....there's a pic on the page that shows all the ladies of the guild and they are wearing sweaters that they knitted as part of a project they did...they all came out real nice...

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Happy Birthday to the United States Marine Corps!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 232 years!!! congrats! Semper Fi from an old Navy guy with lots of respect for the Marines...

this is one of the best videos - - - - many thanks to mike over at Mike's America.

please stop by and check out mike's article that goes along with this video...

smoking for the children?

if you really want to get a sense of what it's going to be like in this country if a democratic leadership (sic?) takes over with the next election - - all you have to do is come to maryland for a bit - - or just search the internet for news of the state government here in taxaland....

thanks to the democrats in baltimore city and baltimore county - those two areas of the state have populations that pretty much outnumber the rest of the state. so to win any public state office you only have to win these two areas and the rest of the state is at your mercy.....

anyway, thanks to those folks up there we have o'malley and his band of tax-ologists for a state leadership. their answer to everything thus far is to tax it - - hence the newest state motto - - if it moves - tax it, if it grows, tax it, if it producers goods, tax it. doesn't matter that businesses are fleeing the state in droves, people are selling and moving away as fast as the housing market lets them - these guys are interested only in one thing - - how can they tax it?

somehow, someone in the flailing horse racing industry of maryland decided that the only way to save horse racing is to legalize slots. so this past week, we had all kinds of racing employees - jockeys, horse care folks, the betting folks, track maintenance folks - - all up in annapolis with signs telling the government folks to save their jobs - legalize the slots!!

now i gotta tell you - i don't know beans about horse racing or race horses. but we do enjoy slots and/or casino environments - - vegas is a favorite place when we just want some "us" away time. now we're not big gamblers - we play strictly for fun, we have our limits and we never hesitate to walk away...but i'm really confused about how putting slots - or any other gambling device/game - into a racetrack environment is going to help the race track.

i understand and agree that it's liable to increase the number of people who will come to the track - - but i don't see it increasing the number of people who will participate in the horse racing portion of the thing. sure you'll get lots of the little old ladys who like to pull the handle, but they ain't gonna bet on a horse. i'll tell ya right away that we would probably go, but you can bet we'd have nothing to do with the horse racing part of the place - it's just not something we enjoy or want to mess with.

so while the race horse industry in this state may be in big trouble, legalizing slots as the cure ain't the answer. what's the REAL reason that the horse industry is in so much trouble? besides the fact that along with all the other industries in this state it's being taxed out of existence....

i am not against slots - don't mind at all if they want to legalize it around here. casino type businesses have good and bad points, but generally i fall on the good side of them.

but i am against legalizing slots as the panacea fix for the state horse racing industry.

it's a well known fact that we need to do more for our veterans and service members. they give their all so that we can live in the styles to which we've become so accustomed.....in some cases giving their all is literal as military members so willingly give their lives for our freedoms.

it's one of those things that you have to have been there in order to understand - if you've not been in the military you simply cannot understand - - no matter how many cnn specials you watch or foxnews reports you watch..understanding the honor and comraderie that exists among all military folks - - active duty, retired, and anyone who did however many years...ya just can't really get it unless you've been there...and i know that's cliche - - but in this case it's truth...

anyway the House Ways and Means Committee agreed to the Heroes Earnings Assistance and Relief Tax Act of 2007 without a quibble over the bill’s 14 benefits, which include making permanent a provision that makes the refundable Earned Income Tax Credit more accessible for military personnel.

semper fi mom did a great writeup on this bill over at
Lubbock Marine Paretns. I hope you'll click over and take a look at it. we should all let our congress reps know that they should support this bill and pass it quickly! it's a good thing...